Thursday, July 7, 2016

Tauy Creek Digest #5: My Wife and Daughter

Joey rolled over in bed and opened his eyes to see Chloe, his daughter, asleep next to him. He smiled at her and touched her soft, blondish-brown hair. Joey got out of bed and went downstairs where his wife, Melinda, was making breakfast. "Good morning, you," she said to him.

"Morning," he kissed her. "Should I wake up Chloe?"

"When breakfast is ready. Should be just a few more minutes," Melinda said.

"Okay. I'm gonna go to the bathroom," Joey kissed Melinda again. When he went in the bathroom, he shut and locked the door and pulled out his cell phone and dialed. "Hey, Ethan, sorry to call so early. What's going on?"

"I just woke up. I was looking at stuff on my phone," Ethan answered.

"I just woke up, too. Found out that I have a wife and child now."

"What?"

"I woke up and there was this girl in my bed. She looked like four-year-old. I went downstairs and there was a woman cooking breakfast. I'm not married, right?"

"Not to my knowledge," Ethan said. "Especially not with a daughter."

"What do I do?"

"I don't know. Talk to her, maybe you can figure this out. Maybe the time-space continuum is intersecting with another dimension or something. I wish I could help you but I'm not very good with time anomalies," Ethan said. "I'll come over later. Around lunch time, okay?"

"Yeah. Maybe I can find something out by then or I'll wake up or something."

"Bye, Joe," Ethan said.

"Bye, Eth," Joey answered and hung up. Joey peed and washed his hands before returning to the kitchen. "Melinda? Do you remember when we first met?" Joey came up behind her and wrapped his arms around her waist.

"Of course I do. It was at an art show where some of my pieces were being shown," Melinda reached behind her shoulder and rubbed Joey's cheek.

"You're an artist?"

She giggled. "You're being silly this morning."

"I'll go get Chloe," Joey kissed Melinda's neck and went upstairs. He passed by a spare bedroom that had the door open. He peeked in and saw dozens of canvasses and many of Melinda's painting laying against the wall. He smiled at them then returned to his bedroom where Chloe was still sleeping. She had his hair and, from what he could tell, his eyes. He softly sat down on the edge of the bed and gently shook the girl. "Chloe, time to get up."

She rolled over and slightly stretched then yawned. "Daddy?"

"Mommy's making breakfast. Come on downstairs."

"Can I just have cereal?" she said sleepily.

"Let's go downstairs. I think you can. We'll see what Mommy says," Joey said. Joey and Chloe went downstairs and sat at the table while Melinda got breakfast served. "Chloe wants to know if she can have cereal for breakfast."

"Mmm, I suppose but she has to help Mommy clean today. Deal?"

"Deal."

They ate breakfast, Chloe finishing first since she just had a bowl of cereal, and Joey helped Melinda clean up after they were finished while Chloe sat in the living room and colored in a coloring book. "Breakfast was amazing," Joey said. "Thank you."

"You're welcome. Is something wrong?"

"What do you mean?"

"You've seemed off today. Kind of like you aren't here but at the same time, you've been very engaged and attentive. This isn't like you," Melinda said.

"Daddy, can we play superheroes?"

"Superheroes?" Joey asked.

Melinda chuckled. "She's your daughter alright."

"Yeah, let's go play superheroes," Joey said and picked up Chloe flying her around the room while making whooshing sounds.

Joey and Chloe played with superhero action figures for awhile before becoming heroes themselves and running around the house fighting with each other. Joey, of course, was the villain. Melinda went upstairs to paint. The morning went by quickly and Ethan came over as Melinda and Joey were fixing lunch--sandwiches, with chips.

"This is weird," Ethan said as they walked out into the front yard. "It's like I know her but I don't. She seemed to know me."

"It is weird. But I like it."

"What?"

"They are really good girls. I feel myself falling in love with both of them. I don't know what's going on but somewhere, in some universe, in some time, I fell in love with this woman and now I get to do what that alternate me can never do. Fall in love with her again for the first time."

"So you're going to stick around? You're going to see this through?"

"I really don't have a choice. Melinda knows me and I can't run out on Chloe."